The Aberdeen Bestiary

Heads up for those who love illuminated manuscript! The University of Aberdeen has just digitized this beautiful bestiary. Check it out! http://www.abdn.ac.uk/bestiary/

Demon Cats!

Hello! With the Halloween season fast approaching, I'm happy to share some demon-cat-related goodness with you. First, however, I must apologize if academia is keeping me too busy to regularly update my blog with new researched blog posts. Luckily, I'm not so busy as to not have time to keep track of my favourite podcasts and, as luck would have it, share with you this recent cat-oriented talk. In this week's edition of MonsterTalk (one of my favourite podcasts), guest speaker Dr. Paul Koudounaris talks about the history of possessed cats in folklore and history. Spooooky! Click below to download the episode!

Butt-licking cat

Hi all,
Just a quicky post to share Kate Beaton's latest blog post which made me laugh:
http://beatonna.tumblr.com/post/98917026965/discardingimages-butt-licking-cat-see-original

Medieval Kitty Paws (again)

Well, looks like Erik Kwakkel dug up another little moment of kitty mischief frozen in time. Check out his latest post here! (P.S. I've tweaked the exposure of the picture above to try to bring out the paw prints)

"Rocket-Cat" Blasts Out of Obscurity

This recent story reminds me of an old morbid joke I heard as a kid. To this day, I still feel ashamed laughing at it: 

How do you make a dog meow? You freeze it overnight and come morning, you run it through an electric saw - Meeeeeeaaaaoooooooowwww.
Now how do you get a cat to bark? You douse it with gas and light a match - Woooooof!

Now that I've gotten this black humor out of the way, you might be interested in reading up about the infamous "Medieval rocket-cat" that's been going around the internet lately... turns out that 1) Yes, this is a real picture, and 2) No, the cat was not part of some sort of medieval space program. Check out the facts, courtesy of the Appendix Blog here.

Animation: Joseph Gagné

Kitty Blunders

Cat owners all know it: their feline friends can often end up where they don't belong or do things they shouldn't. Well, a few examples of past kitty misdeeds have come up on the internet in the past few days. Thanks to these veritable time capsules, we can enjoy the shenanigans of past cats. The story of how a cat's paw prints from the Roman era ended up in British-Columbia is particularly fascinating! Here are (to the best of my knowledge) the original stories: 

• Of cats and manuscripts (March 05, 2013)
• Paws, Pee and Mice: Cats among Medieval Manuscripts (Feb. 22, 2013)
• 1 Kitty, 2 Empires, 2,000 Years: World History Told Through a Brick (Feb. 21, 2013)

A Purrrfect Read*

Even my own kitty approves this book

*Note: This blog post was originally written for my other blog on March 25, 2012. Link.

Title: The Well-Read Cat (Originally titled: Des chats passant parmi les livres)

Author: Michèle Sacquin (Translated by Isabel Ollivier)

Publisher: Bibliothèque nationale de France and Officina Libraria

Published in: 2010, Paris

Pages: 207

As the corny yet inevitable title of this review states, I have just polished off a wonderful little book on cats through history. To be more precise, this book is a sampling of images of cats found in the collections of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Anyone who has visited the famed library (or at least its massive website at gallica.bnf.fr) knows that many treasures are to be found there. It was only a matter of time before a cat lover, incidentally the library’s curator, decided to fish out its feline photographs and imagery. Alongside the panoply of paper cats (as the book calls them), we have the pleasure of reading various quotes on these whiskered critters by famous authors. The main text is a brief exploration of the history of the perception of cats in folklore and popular culture. Thanks to the extensive holdings at the BnF, the author is able to present cats not only in a European context, but a Middle-Eastern and Asian one as well. One page might contain the photograph of an Egyptian cat carved in a regal pose, while another will illustrate a turn-of-the-century French milk ad. Speaking of which, it is good to be reminded that the book was previously published in French before being translated in English and Italian (Gatti di Biblioteca). Rightly so: the allure of this four-legged house-pet reaches beyond geography, as pictures of Japanese pussies will attest to. The reader of this book will also appreciate this last cheeky allusion as the author does not shy away from more explicit symbolism and representations of cats. Indeed, she reminds us that for the longest time, cats were not only linked to witchcraft (in fact, regardless of colour until a few centuries ago), but were equally a symbol of female sexuality. Our only qualm with this book is the numerous mentions of other artwork not reproduced within these pages. Then again, we must remind ourselves that the objective of the book is to highlight only pieces found at the BnF. All in all, even though this book is a relatively short read (easily accomplished in less than an afternoon as I have done, sitting next to the lion statues at the Art Institute of Chicago where I picked up my copy), one can spend hours looking at these wonderful representation of cats through the ages. Do not miss this one, especially if you have a feline companion of your own!

A new meaning to Persian cat...

One seriously creepy medieval puss...

A fine feline if ever there was.